What would you do with Star Trek?

[Tod zu den SD.net Idioten]

Rick Berman and Brannon Braga have just been killed in a so-called "tragic" car crash. Through circumstances that I couldn't be bothered inventing but which are irellevant anyway, control of ST has subsequently fallen to you.

So... how do you do it? What direction does trek take under your leadership?

[Ender]

Put it down for another 20 year rest, then hire some skilled writers who grew up on the stuff but recognize it's mistakes.

Basically exactly what GR did after TAS.

[Solid Snake]

Pretend TNG forward never existed, and make TOS and TMP series....

[Evil Jerk]

I'd hire scientific and military consultants and LISTEN TO THEM before writing any plots.
I'd maintain continuity as much as possible with TOS, and more importantly I'd work to develop characters who are consistent, and the events of one episode would affect the next (fuck the reset button!!!)
I'd also have anyone who comes up with yet another time travel or technology failure episode shot.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Enterprise dies. Boom.



Federation Civil War series.

[Enlightenment]

Put the franchise on holiday for at least a decade, then bring it back with a focus on something other than Ten People on a Starship (or space station). See more civilians for once, and move the time period up a few centuries to get away from the Bozo and Binhead brainrot.

[Isolder74]

Make a series based on the adventures of the Enterprise-B

Make a series based on the adventure of Sulu and the Excelsar

Make a series based on the first captian of the original Enterprise reprising the same sets as TOS only with bett FX but not changing the inside any.

Fire all of the writers and cet someone who knows how to right a good story

[Sam Or I]

Set it during the Cardassian war period. Have it basically be a band of pirates trying to make thereway in the galaxy, hunted by the Feds and the Feringi, on the last of the Orion trading ships. The first episode would be one of them sucking a Fed captian out of the Air Lock showing that this is not the same Trek.

[Mr Bean]

Have both Enterpise and Voyager be in seperate timelines that just happen to be eaten by a giant mutant space goat

[HemlockGrey]

Nuke everything after TNG, including Enterprise. Redo the Borg, and make them cool again. Redo the Dominion War and make it GOOD.

Then, go back, and do Enterprise over, focusing on the Starfleet-Romulan war. And, please, think of the continuity.

[Patrick Degan]

If they had simply struck the tents after TNG wrapped, with that series going out on top, after ten years or so you'd have fans champing at the bit for a new series. Much greater care and consideration could have been taken in crafting the new series, selecting a creative staff, and devising plots and characters. The extra time could have been spent also in examining what went wrong, what mistakes were made, and how to correct them.

But Paramount's greed to keep the cash cow on the milking machine and Berman and Braga's transformation of the Franchise into their own petty fiefdom within the Paramount Corporate Empire has simply drained the life out of Trek, leaving it a withered, dessicated shell of its former self. It's run through all its repetoire of cliches from the 60s and all the new ones arising through the 90s and people are simply sick of it. Or they're bored.

It could well be that Trek has said all it has to say. How many times can you do the ten guys on a starship series? Another war? Been there, done that. And do we really want to give Lost In Space another go? Post-collapse Federation, Federation Civil War? We've already got Andromeda with its tens of viewers for that, or reruns of Babylon 5 on SciFi to fall back on. A Quest show? Crusade didn't last through thirteen on that plot.

Quite simply, its time that Trek went to the showers. It's worn out, creatively bankrupt, predictable, and about as exciting as The Weather Channel. If I took over, I would know that it would be more or less a caretaker post. My only concern would be to at least ensure that Enterprise went out decently by the end of its run. I'd close out the temporal cold war and Suliban machinations and have plots concentrated on Earth discovering its place in the galaxy, which is where the series should always have been oriented in the first place. The soap-opera writers would go and I'd hire actual SF writers to work on the show. And there's be no more of this sex-object nonsense with the crew either. The hell with Trippy the Engineer's fantasies about T'pol, the hell with scripts designed to strip T'pol down to her underwear or debag Hoshi or to having Trippy or Archer running around in the corridors in their boxers. The point of the series is adventure, and that's the way it would be from that point onward. Right up to the end. And if the fanboys whipping their skippy every night with their T'pol cardboard standees don't like it, fuck 'em. The ratings aren't going to improve, so I'd put my energies into simply trying to do the best show I could.

[jegs2]

The Terran Empire (uncorrupted by the "good" Spock, as was done in TOS) conquers all known space, and in their thirst for more pansies to obliterate, they look into alternate dimensions and find .... the Federation. Licking their collective chops, the Terran Empire finds a way into that alternate dimension and quickly crushes the Federation like a wounded cockroach beneath an iron boot.

[Stormbringer]

Declare anything and everything after TOS and the movies non canon and a horrible dream.

I'd give it a five year or so rest. And spend the time working on a technical and historical bible for the series that writers must be familiar to write. I'd make sure it's kept simple and workable.

As a major arc, I'd have the Klingon undergoing a civil war. On one hand you'd have the secular sane Klingons from TOS and the other the religious fanatic Klingons from TNG onward. The Federation would be supporting it's secular allies and the Romulans to weaken the Federation have been support the fanatics. Perfect oppurtunity for action, moral conflict and character development.

I'd pick a Kirk type captain. Charasmatic, bold, and principled. Not the jello for a back bone, speech making bozos in charge now. A good captain and a diverse, well rounded crew.

And then I'd had the basic idea off to some good writers and see where it goes.

[Next of Kin]

Rick Berman and Brannon Braga have just been killed in a so-called "tragic" car crash. Through circumstances that I couldn't be bothered inventing but which are irellevant anyway, control of ST has subsequently fallen to you.

So... how do you do it? What direction does trek take under your leadership?

Well at first, I would turn Star Trek into a 1/2 sitcom and put it up against Friends on Thursday. After the series ran it's course I would keep shoving down the audience's throats by showcasing a Star Trek variety hour with skits, songs, and special guests!

[SWPIGWANG]

Startrek - communist wonderland Shows how a PC family lives in trek-verse.

I'd say I'd make movies using the ST background. It is a far superior medium than fill in the week TV series. We can focus on far more interesting stuff like contact with non-homonoid, non-sentient, intelligent life or giant wars with lots of stuff blown up or something.

[Evil Jerk]

Well at first, I would turn Star Trek into a 1/2 sitcom and put it up against Friends on Thursday. After the series ran it's course I would keep shoving down the audience's throats by showcasing a Star Trek variety hour with skits, songs, and special guests!

It's a good thing B&B don't hang around here, because they'd probably take this idea and do it.

[SPOOFE]

Forget any of this "declare such-and-such noncanon". To hell with that. Won't work.

Instead, blow it up.

I'm serious. Put the series on hiatus for five years, during which time I - and a small cadre of carefully-selected, highly-trusted writers who KNOW WHAT THE FUCK THEY'RE DOING - will figure out the bulk of the storyline. It will be no more than five seasons long, and will have a set beginning, middle, and end. Most episodes for the entire series will be written - or at least heavily conceptualized - before filming begins.

Set it a century or two after TNG. Forget all the crap about the future. If anyone asks, I'll say that there was a massive, cosmic upheaval, caused by the Q, that sealed off the timeline, removed most cosmic powers from the universe, destabilized subspace, and destroyed much of galactic civilization. The Federation, the Romulans, the Klingons... their empires are decimated and non-existent. All that remains are hegemonies of multi-specied groups that are trying to put their galaxy back together. I'll call it "The Great Reset Button" (facetiously, of course).

The series will follow numerous groups, trying to fight off pirates while attempting to piece together their history. They discover the hulk of a Monarch-class ship called... the Enterprise-F. It gives them clues about their history, and about the galactic upheaval.

There'll be some old staples lying around. The Voth will still be running around (and will probably feature prominently), although their city ships will be greatly weakened by the Upheaval. The Borg? They've gone insane, apparently. Not as powerful (subspace's destabilizing has had far-reaching effects), not as intelligent, but far more malicious and animalistic than ever before. I'd envision them as massively mutated creatures, twisted and tormented, and far more machine now than before (and no more of this "uber nanoprobes" nonsense). Phasers? Sure, why not. I'm not going to change Trek that radically.

Ships will no longer look like Rorschach tests gone bad. I'll maintain the TNG+ look of sleek and smooth, but goddammit, enough of these saucers attached to a couple cylinders. Furthermore, each species (no, they won't be called "races") will be given at least a LITTLE bit of cultural diversity... let's see some Klingons who DON'T drink blood wine, eat worms, and sing drinking songs, for once.

Ultimately, the series will go through several significant conflicts, against corrupt governments that have managed to seize local pockets of the galaxy. Think "Mad Max in Space". The series will culiminate with a five-part battle-to-the-finish, in which the heroes put forth an all-out effort to destroy the bad guys. There will be two feature films that go along with the series, one released at the mid-point, and one released as the final episode, in which the heroes finally overthrow the bad guys completely, bring some semblance of order to their region of space, and go about trying to rebuild the vaunted "Federation" that they heard so much about.

If the series goes over well enough, I'll take another year or so of hiatus and set up yet another five-year run.

[Sam Or I]

There is no TV series (That I know of) about the seedy side of life in the Galaxy. Hense the Privateer theme. Out for the Profit, adventure, and show that the Captian will if nessesary space his crew. I am still waiting for someone to do that in sci-fi. :twisted: . Maybe there is, its been about 4 years since I actually watched TV.

[Sam Or I]

The Sapranos in Space. (of course I have not seen the show, but I hear it is good.)

[Patrick Degan]

Set it a century or two after TNG. Forget all the crap about the future. If anyone asks, I'll say that there was a massive, cosmic upheaval, caused by the Q, that sealed off the timeline, removed most cosmic powers from the universe, destabilized subspace, and destroyed much of galactic civilization. The Federation, the Romulans, the Klingons... their empires are decimated and non-existent. All that remains are hegemonies of multi-specied groups that are trying to put their galaxy back together. I'll call it "The Great Reset Button" (facetiously, of course).

The series will follow numerous groups, trying to fight off pirates while attempting to piece together their history. They discover the hulk of a Monarch-class ship called... the Enterprise-F. It gives them clues about their history, and about the galactic upheaval.

Ultimately, the series will go through several significant conflicts, against corrupt governments that have managed to seize local pockets of the galaxy. Think "Mad Max in Space". The series will culiminate with a five-part battle-to-the-finish, in which the heroes put forth an all-out effort to destroy the bad guys. There will be two feature films that go along with the series, one released at the mid-point, and one released as the final episode, in which the heroes finally overthrow the bad guys completely, bring some semblance of order to their region of space, and go about trying to rebuild the vaunted "Federation" that they heard so much about.

The problem is, we've already got something like parading around on TV: Andromeda, with its tens of viewers.

[Patrick Degan]

Well at first, I would turn Star Trek into a 1/2 sitcom and put it up against Friends on Thursday. After the series ran it's course I would keep shoving down the audience's throats by showcasing a Star Trek variety hour with skits, songs, and special guests!

Hire James Darren as its star, and it could be Star Trek: Vic Fontaie —which was aleady a good chunk of DS9's last season (interrupted at times by this war thing...)

[HemlockGrey]

Andromeda is a great show

There is no TV series (That I know of) about the seedy side of life in the Galaxy. Hense the Privateer theme. Out for the Profit, adventure, and show that the Captian will if nessesary space his crew. I am still waiting for someone to do that in sci-fi. . Maybe there is, its been about 4 years since I actually watched TV.

Firefly, maybe?

[VF5SS]

What would I do with Trek?

CANCEL IT!

[Stormbringer]

Andromeda is a great show

There is no TV series (That I know of) about the seedy side of life in the Galaxy. Hense the Privateer theme. Out for the Profit, adventure, and show that the Captian will if nessesary space his crew. I am still waiting for someone to do that in sci-fi. . Maybe there is, its been about 4 years since I actually watched TV.

Firefly, maybe?

Nah, the Captain in Firefly doesn't strike we as that kind of guy. Nor is it a pirate ship. They're some sort free traders on the poverty stricken edge of the galaxy.

[SPOOFE]

The problem is, we've already got something like parading around on TV: Andromeda, with its tens of viewers.

Eh. There's nothing new under the sun.